There are a variety of conventional methods of cooking raw food, including baking, broiling, boiling, frying, and, more recently, using microwave or high frequency radio waves which generate heat. Regardless of what method of cooking is used, it is generally desirably for several reasons, to cook food in the fastest possible manner. In institutional or commercial food operations, it is obvious that greater efficiency and less costs result from faster cooking, and in home cooking, less food preparation time offers obvious advantages. These considerations have resulted in the advent of cooking apparatus and methods which are particularly designed to speed up the cooking process, such as microwave ovens, and pressure cookers in which the temperature of cooking medium (e.g. water) can be raised above its normal boiling point to thereby decrease the time required to cook food in the cooking medium.
Fast cooking, however, presents problems which can result in waste because of food shrinkage and which adversely affect the palatal characteristics of the food. For example, in pan frying food, it will be apparent that cooking time can be proportionately decreased by increasing the temperature of the heat source applied to the pan, but, at very elevated pan surface temperatures, the surface of the food which is in contact with the pan surface may be burned. Moreover, food which is cooked rapidly tends to loose some of its natural flavor which is "boiled off" during the cooking process, and, in some instances, the food will tend to curl up or otherwise become distorted.
In an effort to avoid curling of the food, it is a common practice to provide a flat cover that is placed on the food to hold it against curling while it is being cooked, a typical example of a cover of this type being disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,252,404, issued May 24, 1966. It will be apparent, however, that these covers will not reduce the possibility of the food being burned if the pan surface temperature exceeds a predetermined level, and the food must be turned periodically to provide even cooking of the food.
To reduce food shrinkage and curling, at elevated cooking temperatures, and to avoid surface contact burning of the food, it has been proposed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,191,275 issued Feb. 20, 1940, that the food be compressed between a pair of pressure plates and then suspended in a pot of hot oil which is heated by an external heater unit. Cooking in this manner reduces the cooking time and avoids the danger of surface contact burning because the food is suspended, and the required heat for fast cooking is obtained from oil which can be raised to a very high temperature (e.g. 350.degree. F.) without boiling. However, this method of cooking has certain drawbacks, including the fact that the cooked food is greasy because of its continuous surface contact with the oil during cooking, and the disadvantages normally associated with the storage and use of oil.
In accordance with the present invention, all of the culinary advantages associated with pan cooked food are obtained, yet the food is cooked quite rapidly without burning and without the ordinary shrinkage and flavor loss that is normally associated with pan cooked food.